PS200 – American Politics & Government

Instructor(s)

The basic approach of the course follows Founding Father James Madison, who said faction [conflict] is “sown into the nature of man.” This course presents different, disagreeing, maybe disagreeable to you and sometimes mutually contradictory accounts of American politics. Your tasks are first to understand each and every account, and then to decide how much truth, usefulness, and elegance each account has, and finally to begin to put them together to form your own answers to “Who governs? Who benefits?”.